


Horror Movies and Cat Videos

by mylittlecrumbcake



Series: grojband one-shots [1]
Category: Grojband
Genre: F/M, Sleepover Fic, This is me, Wow, corey is flustered, don't read this this sucks, except i'm gay and laney is dealing with boy problem, i am laney in this fic, i hate this, lenny is there for texting moral support, this fic is literally just me forcing my problems onto laney, this is also poorly written, this is me self projecting, this is so old, um, we love a supportive friend, why did I write this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:53:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27117779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mylittlecrumbcake/pseuds/mylittlecrumbcake
Summary: A surprise sleepover turns into an unexpected viewing of the new "Super Blood Fest 3" movie. Turns out Corey Riffin is scared of horror movies. Who knew?
Relationships: Laney Penn/Corey Riffin
Series: grojband one-shots [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1979380
Comments: 1
Kudos: 15





	Horror Movies and Cat Videos

Five minutes. Five minutes was all she had. Five minutes until her world ends. Five minutes isn’t a whole lot of time to get your affairs in order.

Five minutes until Corey Riffin came over to her house to spend the night.

Sure, the two have had sleepovers before. He’s been over to her house before. He’s been in her room before. This shouldn’t be a huge deal, _right_? Right, but usually she gets more notice than a text that says ‘I’m coming over in five minutes, get ready for the best sleepover you’ve ever had!’ She usually at least gets half an hour or more to clean up her room and prepare herself to deal with Corey for however long he decides to stay. Not five minutes. The worst part about the situation was the text she sent back to him.

‘let yourself upstairs, door is unlocked! see ya soon :)’

Who says that? Who willingly sets themselves up for embarrassment? Laney didn’t know where to even begin. She started shoving things in her closet and in random drawers in her nightstand, knowing she probably will never see those belongings ever again. The mess of her room was borderline uncharacteristic. Usually, the girl is incredibly put together, and so is her room, but at this current given moment, everything is a reflection of her mental state: panic.

“You’ve seen Core’s room way messier than this, Laney. And I mean _way_ messier.” She muttered to herself as she threw her elephant stuffed animal into her closet, slamming the doors behind her. “You have nothing to be worried about, there’s nothing to be—”

“LANES! Are you READY TO PARTY?!” Corey burst into her room, sending Laney into the air, then suddenly onto the ground. “…Guess I should have told you I was here, huh?” He threw his bag onto her floor, reaching a hand out to help her back up.

“A little warning would have been nice, but you’re fine, don’t worry about it.”She grabbed onto his hand and let herself get back onto her feet. “Thanks. So what’s up with the surprise sleepover, Core? I didn’t really get a chance to clean up or anything, so sorry if things are messy.” Laney’s face was warm with embarrassment due to the current _disarray_ of her room.

“Messy? We both know this is not a mess. Have you seen the garage lately? Being there should be considered a health hazard at this point. I’d like to blame it on literally anyone but me, but I did let it get to that point.”

“Yeah, I was going to say something last practice sesh but I decided to just let it be.” Laney smiled and sat on her bed. “Didn’t know if you were going through some sort of existential crisis or not. You haven’t explained the surprise sleepover yet.”

“Are explanations really necessary, Lanes? Explanations are just—”

“Don’t think this is the moment for a monologue.” Laney crossed her arms.

“I guess you’re right. I don’t really know. I was bored. It’s a Saturday. Trina’s being extra Trina-y today. Also, wanted to chill with my fave lil’ bassist.” Corey walked over to the seat in her windowsill, practically flopping over. “We can watch movies and stuff.”

Laney found it hard not to smile at the last excuse he gave. “Sounds like a plan. Want food or something? I can see what I have here. Worst case scenario we can take a walk to the gas station.”

“Do you have popcorn? Popcorn is always the move.” Corey flipped onto his stomach while Laney thought for a moment.

“I think so. I’ll go see. You pick out a movie, and nothing too sappy or sad. I’m expecting either to see people getting sawed in half in full detail or people doing backflips off buildings. Choose wisely.” And with that, Laney disappeared downstairs. Corey pulled his laptop out of his bag, opening up a new window. _She wants something gory. Great. I guess there’s“Super Blood Fest 3?” I hear that it was good. Apparently. Well, Kin and Kon said it was good. Nick Mallory said it was “Nick-approved” on Bleater. Trina thinks anything that Nick likes is something she likes. Something named “Super Blood Fest 3” doesn’t really seem up Trina’s alley though. But Lanes would probably dig this._ He sighed, silently hoping that Laney would pick another movie.

Laney soon came back with a large bowl of popcorn. “Consider this sleepover officially underway! What movie did you find?” Laney set the bowl on her bed and walked over to Corey and his laptop. “No way! _Super Blood Fest 3?_ Core, I’ve been dying to see this movie since it came out. Apparently, according to Nick Mallory’s _professional opinion_ it is the ‘perfect blend of gore and romance. Top ten in the Nick Picks.’ We have to see it!”

Corey’s face dropped. “Are you sure? It’s pretty gory-I MEAN it’s probably super cheesy! With a title like that, I’m expecting low quality special effects. I can find something better for us! I mean we can watch…uh…” He closed his eyes and clicked on a random movie. Opening his eyes slowly to see what he randomly chose. “ _Rainbow Princesses 5…_ A classic choice, really.” _Seriously, Corey? You couldn’t have picked a lamer choice. Rainbow Princesses 5? Laney should kick you out just for saying the movie’s name out loud._ “OR! Hear me out, we don’t watch a movie! It was a dumb idea of mine to begin with, really! Movies are long and boring! We can play games or something!” He forced a smile onto his face as the girl beside him stared at him with a quizzical look.

“No. Absolutely not, Core. It’ll be cool! Trust me, it can’t be _that_ cheesy. Did you see Cherry Grapestain’s new movie? Now _that_ was cheesy. It was basically just 90 minutes of Cherry crying over nothing and then making out with some random dude. Turn on Super Blood Fest 3. It can’t be any worse than that mushy pile of mess. Also, I didn’t make popcorn for _Rainbow Princesses 5_.” Laney sat back down on her bed patting the spot right beside her. Corey hesitantly plugged his laptop into the television near her closet and sat down next her. _Here goes nothing, I guess._

__

The title card appeared onto the screen with bright red, dripping letters, clearly illustrating the “blood” part of _Super Blood Fest 3_. Corey already was uneasy, but he was trying his hardest to not let that show. Laney, being the incredibly observant person she was, glanced over at him. She wasn’t going to mention how tense he looked. Yet. Maybe she’s overthinking this. This is Corey. He can’t be scared of a little horror movie. Right?

Minutes started to feel like hours for the guitarist. The plot continuously acted as if it was wrapping up, but would immediately introduce a new set of conflicts and relationships. Overall, it was about some girl named Zoey falling in love with a serial killer, who’s real name is never really stated, and her not being able to recognize that murder is kind of messed up and she continues to have feelings for the guy. The guy ends up saying the whole murder thing is to impress her or something. Zoey dies in the end, which is pretty sucky because the serial killer loved her. Apparently. Like Nick said, _perfect blend of gore and romance._ But Corey wouldn’t really know, because he can’t get himself to pay attention. Lots of chainsaws and blood. Laney, on the other hand, was having a great time. Not because she’s finally getting to see the movie she’s been wanting to see, but she’s learning something new about the boy she’s had feelings for since the fifth grade.

Corey Riffin hates horror movies.

At first, she was amused. Corey, the boy who single handedly beat a horde of zombies, rocked a sewer monster to sleep, and saved the world from impending doom, was scared of the movie. However, this amusement soon turned into anxiety. Halfway into the movie, around the fourth chainsaw victim or so, he grabbed onto Laney’s arm, pulling her uncomfortably close to him. His grip on her arm was incredibly tight, but it wasn’t painful in the slightest. She felt as if she couldn’t breathe anymore. Minutes would pass, and he wouldn’t move. He’d occasionally hide in Laney’s hair if it got too bloody. It now seemed that Corey was paying more attention to the movie than she was.

What was she supposed to do? Let him be this close to her and make her not able to formulate a sentence without getting flustered? Seemed easier than pushing him away. He’s scared, it’d be cruel to not comfort him. Besides, she would never admit it out loud, but she’d kill to get this close to Corey. Laney thought her best course of action was to actually comfort him or actually confront him about it. Maybe it will progress into something.

“Are you scared, Core?”

“What? Absolutely not! …Are you?”

“I’m not the one clinging onto someone else. We don’t need to watch the rest if you really don’t want to.”

“No, this is fine! The movie is almost over right? Like—”

“We’re like half an hour in.”

“That’s pretty much over! Also I’m not scared. That’s dumb. And totally not punk rock.”

“You know it’s okay to be…You know what, never mind. I’ve never seen you so scared before, honestly it’s kinda cute.”

_Oh no._

“It’s what?”

  
  
“What?”

Laney stared at the ground in horror. _I really said that. What am I supposed to do? How do I fix this?_ She felt the grip on her arm lessen, which was disappointing, but to be expected. _That was probably scarier than the movie itself._ “I didn’t say anything, you must be imagining things.”

“You said—”

“No, I didn’t.”

“—that I was cute.”

“That doesn’t ring a bell. Nope. I never said that. You have no witnesses.”

The movie has now faded into background noise and the popcorn bowl was now neglected. Laney was refusing to make eye contact with the boy who was intensely looking at her with a big dumb grin on his face. Her eyes were fixed on the floor and nothing else. Does she tell him her feelings? Is this really the moment? The more she thought about it, it did seem like a decent plan. The absence of the Kujira boys was the most convincing factor. But is she ready for that sort of thing? She didn’t mentally prepare to have a full blown confession moment today.

“Lanes, you said—”

“No I didn’t!”

“This is literally the funniest thing in the world, just admit it!”

“Why would I admit to doing something I never did?”

  
  
“Have you ever heard of a plea deal before?”

  
  
“What would I be getting out of this? The joy of knowing I’m lying?”

“Precisely!”

“Fine! I said it. Are you happy?”

Corey was having the time of his life. Seeing his best friend reacting the way only she would was one of his favorite things in the world. This happened quite a bit and he wasn’t really sure why. What confused him more was the fact that he loved seeing her get so nervous. His feelings confused him, sure, but he wasn’t about to question them anytime soon. Not because he didn’t _want_ to question them, he just didn’t know how to.

The silence was broken by a bloodcurdling scream coming from the movie that was forgotten about for a moment. Then they were back in the same position they were in the first time. Corey grabbed onto Laney, pulling her into him, with his eyes shut tightly. “Whywhywhywhywhywhywhy?! He can’t just do that! That shouldn’t be allowed, that should be illegal!”  
  
“It’s chainsaw murder, Core, it _is_ illegal.” Laney felt a lot less nervous about the closeness this time. She gently rubbed his shoulder to comfort him. “It’s going to be fine. Breathe.”

They stayed like that for the rest of the movie, and Laney, after 60 minutes, finally got a control of her pulse. Corey let out a sigh as soon as the end credits started to roll. “What a relief, it’s over. I thought my eyes would never open again. So, was _Super Blood Fest 3_ up to your expectations?”

“It was okay. Could have had a little more blood and a little less smoochy-smoochy. A solid seven out of ten.” Laney shrugged, mildly still in shock that he still hasn’t moved. “It’s not even midnight yet. What do you want to do now?” She said while reaching towards the bowl of popcorn. Time seemed to stop as her hand lightly grazed against Corey’s in the popcorn bowl. _Laney, this is literally nothing. You’ve kissed this boy before, and you’re basically cuddling with him at this point. You’re losing it over a mild hand touch. Breathe. Everything is fine. I’m fine._

She wasn’t the only person to tense up at the small interaction. Corey quickly maneuvered his hand away and grabbed a handful of popcorn and shoved it in his mouth. “So…did you mean…you know…”

  
  
“Huh?”

“You know…the thing where you said I was cute?”

“Well…” Laney slowly tried to maneuver herself away from him without disturbing the mood. “I mean, yeah. Why would I say it if I didn’t mean it?”

“I don’t know, I just…”

All that there was in the room was a silence that neither of them wanted to experience. Laney was pretty sure she stopped breathing. This is not how she expected to spend her Saturday night. She was more expecting to maybe do some of her homework that was due on Monday, maybe read or watch a dumb sitcom. She was not anticipating having to confront her _romantic_ feelings for Corey. Even spending time with Corey in the first place wasn’t on the agenda. But here they both were, practically in each others arms.

Corey, on the other hand, was uncharacteristically confused and panicked. _Why am I nervous? This is Lanes we’re talking about, there’s no reason to be nervous around her. We’ve been buds since, like, grade school! We’ve even kissed that one time._ He suddenly gets hit with a huge wave of realization. _Ohhh, right. We’ve kissed. But that change anything, did it? Did it? I mean I think about it a lot but that doesn’t mean I like her in that way, does it? Oh no. Oh no, Corey, this isn’t good. No, you’re just confused and overthinking this. The kiss was an accident! It didn’t mean anything. I mean, it did. It totally did. But it probably didn’t mean anything to her, right? She probably doesn’t even remember it. I…I don’t know what I’m feeling but I’m not a huge fan of this._ Suddenly, Corey got sick of being stuck in the silence with his thoughts.

“I mean, you are too.”

“What?”

“Yeah, I don’t know…I’ve always kinda thought you were cute, ya know?”

Laney’s entire body stiffened. She didn’t know how to process this information. Corey Riffin, the boy she liked for what seems like forever just admitted that she, Laney Penn, was cute. This isn’t real, is it? No. It couldn’t be. She noticed that his face was red. That was a first. _Is he nervous?_ She’s never seen him get this flustered before. Maybe this was real. Maybe it was the lack of oxygen she was experiencing due to her forgetting to breathe.

“Was that weird to say? I’m sorry if—”

“It wasn’t weird, not at all! I’m just…thank you…” Laney managed to squeak out, grabbing the popcorn bowl and promptly stood up. “I-I’m going to go put this away! Yep! Be right back!” And like that, she bolted out of the room and downstairs.

The bowl was haphazardly thrown onto the counter in the kitchen as Laney slammed her head into the counter. “What is happening? Why is this happening? What do I do?” She took out her phone and dialed in the number of the one person she could talk to about this.

_“Hi! This is Lenny Nepp, bassist of the Newmans! Sorry I couldn’t answer your call, leave a message and I’ll get right back to you!”_

Laney groaned. Of course. It’s night, why would Lenny answer her? “Hey, Lenny. It’s Laney. You know that. So uh. I’m having a bit of a _crisis_ right now and I need some advice. Just call me back as soon as you can.”

As Laney went down to her kitchen, Corey decided to go to the restroom across from her room and splash some cold water in his face. “Calm down. Why am I acting so stupid? This is stupid. It’s fine, we’ll go to sleep soon, right?” He glanced down at his phone. 11:30. “That’s a normal time to go to sleep.” He shortly returned to Laney’s room, noticing that she had gotten back from downstairs. He quickly changed back to his normal demeanor. “Did you want to do anything else?”

“Nope! I mean if you want to do something else, but I’m ready to sleep if you are!” Laney laughed nervously as she slammed her phone down onto the bed. Corey smiled a bit. _She obviously had the same thought I did. Thank goodness._

“AWESOME! I-I mean, cool. Cool. Sleepies time!”

  
  
“ _Sleepies?”_

“Sleepies.” Corey grabbed his sleeping bag and unrolled it onto the floor, quickly crawling into it. “Goodnight!”

“Goodnight…?” Laney watched this all happen at lightning speed. She was confused. Normally Corey is never nervous about anything. She has never seen this happen before. The worst part is that she doesn’t know how to respond to any of it. Addressing it seemed absolutely terrifying, but ignoring it doesn’t seem any less terrifying. However, ignoring it was the easier option, so that was the option she chose. She turned the lights off and sat back down on her bed. She thought her best course of action was to just sit on her phone for a few hours until she got tired.

Minutes passed by, and aside from the tossing and turning from Corey in his sleeping bag, it was pretty much silent. Laney was tapping away on her phone, texting Lenny about her issues.

_lenster: sorry i missed your call, wats wrong?_

_corey’s over. we basically were cuddling for like an entire horror movie. accidentally said he was cute. he said i was cute. he’s nervous. i’m nervous. i hate this. i hate this so much._

_lenster: wait wait wait WHAT? omg_

_lenster: this is so exciting_

_lenster: this is such a good thing_

_lenster: he’s nervous??? this doesn’t seem in character_

_lenster: smthin is up laney. i’d investigate!_

_this is probably nothing. nothing is happening. but he said “i always kinda thought you were cute” or something like that. what does that mean help_

_i’m scared_

_lenster: WHAT_

_lenster: i wonder what that could possibly mean_ 🤔🤔🤔

_lenny this is serious i dont know what he means_

_lenster: he means exactly what he said. corey might be oblivious but at least he’s straight to the point_

_no he’s not_

_lenster: but why would he say that and not mean it? seems kinda sus to me_

_it’s corey we’re talking about, he also said i made a cute girl once. it means nothing_

_lenster: but he didn’t get nervous that time_

_lenster: and he’s nervous now_

_lenster: awwww corey likes you how cute_

_lenster: get it girl! i no longer can stay awake. gn_

_ugh. fine. gn. you were no help_

Laney sighed and slammed her phone on her nightstand, receiving a small yelp from a sleeping bag on the floor. “Corey? You good?” She whispered, not really sure if he actually was still awake.

“Yeah! Totally!”

“You’re still awake? Why?”

“Uhh…just scared of the horror movie! You got me! I’ll admit it, I was scared of _Super Blood Fest_ 3! Can’t sleep! Uh-huh, that’s it!” Corey mentally slapped himself. _She’s going to see right through that. This is so stupid, I hate this._

_“_ I knew it! I knew you were scared!”

“You’re never going to let me live this down, huh?”

“Nope! Absolutely not! The movie wasn’t even that bad!” Laney smiled and turned in her bed to face him. “Wanna get your mind off it? We can watch funny videos or something.” She winced. _Why on EARTH would I ask him that? I’m so stupid! This is so stupid, I hate this!_

Almost instantly, Corey was beside her on her bed, ready to get his mind off _the horror movie that was keeping him awake._ He realizes this probably isn’t the greatest idea to stop thinking about the awkwardness in the room that he created and the odd feeling in his stomach, but he likes hanging out with Laney. _She’s so cool and awesome and funny and—_

“W-what do you want to watch?” Laney seemed to be more nervous than before, and for the first time ever, Corey took intensive notice.

“I…I don’t know. Just click on something random?” Corey shrugged and grabbed onto one of Laney’s pillows. She did as he asked, and clicked on some cat video.

They stayed there for forty-five minutes. Things seemed to be less awkward after awhile. They were laughing and watching cat videos, a cure-all for any uncomfortable situation. As soon as Laney was about to turn on another video, she felt an unexpected weight on her shoulder. Corey had fallen asleep. She smiled a little, her face reddening at the sudden contact. She set her phone back down on the nightstand. Is she supposed to push him off? Is she supposed to say something? At least this isn’t as awkward as before, right?

Maybe she’ll deal with this tomorrow. This was pretty nice, and she doesn't want to question anything else tonight.

**Author's Note:**

> this is so selfish. and based on my life. except it's one-sided and sad.


End file.
